hard to select gears

[steve13]

Hi all. My daughter has a 2003 1.8L manual astra.

When shes been driving for awhile, usually coming home from uni , occasionally she finds it very difficult to change gears. Apparently it becomes hard to change down from one gear to the next and she has to pull over and turn the car off before she is able to select any gears. This doesn't seem to happen on shorter trips.

(I've never worked on an hydraulic clutch system before (my cars have all been cable operated))

Could this be a clutch master or slave system fault?...or both?

[guy 27]

change gearbox fluid first. this will most likely fix the issue.

[steve13]

thanks for the quick reply guy 27.
will change oil tomorrow.

[steve13]

Well that was fun.
Jacked car up and put it on ramps.
removed sump and drained what looked like transmission fluid( red in colour and seemed fairly thin, runny).
Nobody had a gasket on the shelf (Being Sunday doesn't help LOL, and seeing as its an unservicable item couldn't be bothered waiting till i could order it thru either Holden or Ebay)
So cut out a gasket from .8mm oil resistant gasket paper. Cleaned the loctite from the bolt holes with a tap and then put all back together with some new thread sealer.
I filled the gearbox using penrite 75W-85 pro gear oil thru the breather as stated in one of the other posts and used approx 2.3lts.
After roadtesting no leaks so :smile5:
Wont know if this fixes the problem until the cars had a good run so fingers crossed...

[Noosaastra]

I just went through a similar process, did changing the oil fix the issue, or are you looking at the slave cylinder now...

[steve13]

I just went through a similar process, did changing the oil fix the issue, or are you looking at the slave cylinder now...

changed the gearbox oil, and just to be on the safe side, bled the slave cylinder and its been fine since

[Noosaastra]

Thanks for the reply, much appreciated.
Just changed the gearbox oil, will bleed the slave next
Cheers